The Cigar Advisor blog is aimed at cigar smokers seeking advice and information about imported premium handmade cigars. Like CigarAdvisor.com, the primary function of this blog is to provide a useful resource for cigar smokers to learn more about their favorite pastime including news and information on new cigars, plus cigar and cigar accessory reviews.

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Friday, February 1, 2008

About a month ago I had an interesting tête-à-tête with my friend Ken about how when you remove the cigar band, sometimes a piece of the wrapper comes off with it, too. It went something like this:

KEN: You know what I hate? Cigar bands that stick to the wrapper. When I spend $2 to $5 per stick, the least I should expect is a band that's easily removed. It also seems to be happening more often with a number of premium cigars. IMO, the manufacturers go to great pains to roll their cigars properly, but fail miserably when affixing the bands to the cigar.

GARY: Agreed. Nothing's more frustrating than peeling the band off a $5 or $10 cigar only to find the wrapper peeling along with it. You're the first to bring this up. Maybe most guys don't mention it because it really doesn't happen that often; or, they just leave their bands on anyway, so how would they know.

KEN: I like to smoke the cigar down to about one inch, and with the size of some of the bands, it's impossible to smoke more than 2/3 its length before burning into the band. I've also tried rolling the cigar between my fingers at the band, but it doesn't help when the glue is attached to the wrapper.

GARY: Sure, if the cigar's a winner, I like to make it a finger burner, too. But even though I prefer to remove the band early on, I usually let the heat from the cigar loosen the glue as the cigar burns closer to the band. It seems to work most of the time; keyword, "most." Only on occasion have I burned the band, but because I wasn't paying attention.

KEN: I wish companies like Famous Smoke Shop and others would bring this problem to the attention of the manufacturers and demand that they fix it.

GARY: Since you mention it, I once had a problem with a box of Gran Habano #1 Toros. I contacted the manufacturer and they said they'd look into it. Knowing the integrity of the company, I'm confident they did so. I also think that they use too much glue on the Avo cigars. I guess it's because they use a heavier paper. It's not so much getting the band off, but getting under the glue to peel the tail of the band.

KEN: Perhaps you should run a survey and see how many customers have experienced similar problems with their premiums.

7 comments:

I'm one of those weird guys who saves bands to paste into a journal. So yes, I like to get the band off (in one piece) to save it.Usually, I wait 'til it's about and get burned and the glue under it has softened from the heat.However, once I took ten cigars from my humidor and removed the bands so that I could smoke them 'blind' over the next several months. What a disaster! Most were ok, but a few tore the wrapper along with them or the bands themselves tore up.Maybe in the future, if I want to do a blind tasting, I'll try to cover them somehow instead.

I think I have had this problem once or twice since I have started smoking...both where on R&J Bully. For the most part I would like to see the cigar bands just glued to its self and wrapped tight around the cigar, there not going to slip off between box and your humidor.

I whole heartedly agree with you guys that when you pay between $5-$15 for a premium/ultra premium only to have the band stuck to the wrapper really gives me the red ass. I've been lucky with my bands as of lately. I don't think anything in my humi have given me a problem(knock on wood). In the past though I think it was Natural cigars that had a problem with that for me. That was when I first started smoking about 7 years ago.

I have to agree to this. I cant stand it when I am smoking one of my favorites, AVO #2, and the band wont come off easily. It tears the leaf and sometimes causes the last 2-3 inches to become just, well crappy. I have wondered if the premiums do this to deter the removal as to have the identity always showing on the smoke, and if left in an ashtray as some sort of ashtray advertisement....who knows why they use that superglue anyhow!Mark

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CigarAdvisor is the official blog for CigarAdvisor.com. The Executive Editor is Gary Korb, Senior copywriter for Famous-Smoke.com, the nation's leading online discount retailer of premium handmade cigars.